Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Figure 2.2
The design of Village Homes includes strategies such as ribbon curbs (left), bioswales and
lush landscaping (top right), and the careful siting of housing with respect to existing drain-
age pathways (bottom right). Source : Govind Gopakumar.
second goal of community building that refl ects the relational perspective
of urban ecologists. The project is most easily traversed on foot or bicycle,
with narrow cul-de-sac streets for cars and only 15 percent of the project
devoted to streets and parking, as opposed to 22 percent in surrounding
neighborhoods. 72 The houses are located on small private lots connected
by commonly owned and maintained open spaces as well as community
agricultural lands. The Corbetts designed a natural stormwater system
of bioswales and ponds in these community spaces to reduce hydrologic
impacts and long-term maintenance costs, similar to Low Impact Devel-
opment strategies.
The topologic character of the development is in direct contrast to de-
signers who advocate for a traditional urban grid pattern. This confl ict in
design approaches was readily apparent when the Corbetts collaborated
with New Urbanist practitioners such as Peter Calthorpe, Andres Duany,
and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk in the early 1990s to develop the Ahwahnee
Principles. The merging of New Urbanism, understood as a socially ori-
ented planning logic, and the Corbetts form of ecological planning resulted
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